Storming the City
by da-angel729
Summary: The storm came out of nowhere, drenching the city's docks with rain, lightning flashing and thunder rumbling.


**Author's Note:** Stargate Atlantis belongs to MGM, SyFy, etc. Written for **leesa_perrie** for the 2011 Thing A Thon at **rononficathon** on LiveJournal with a prompt of _thunder_. I hope you like it! As always, feedback and con crit appreciated.

**Storming the City**

The storm came out of nowhere, drenching the city's docks with rain, lightning flashing and thunder rumbling. Atlantis—and her inhabitants—shook with the force of it, dimming the city's lights and filling the rooms with gloom.

For the fifth straight day.

Ronon caught sight of Weir standing on the balcony outside the control room, and noted with relief that she was standing closer to the city than the edge. Of course, she wasn't crazy, and to stand at the edge of the balcony—even with a waist-high ledge—would have been foolish.

He wanted to stay on the balcony himself.

He hated being indoors. Though he felt at home in Atlantis—having grown up in the concrete mess of Sateda—there'd always been a chance to go outside, to feel solid ground. Now, due to Atlantis' unique location in the middle of an ocean, he only had that on missions.

Which had been cancelled.

Weir had suspended all gate operations so the majority of the people could clean up five of the city's docks that sustained heavy damage. McKay and Radek were still trying to figure out how the storm broke through the city's shields.

He'd been helping Sheppard on the East Pier when communications had gone down, city wide, cutting off the teams from the Control Room. Because the clean-up work was tedious but not particularly difficult, Ronon'd been tapped to run messages between the two places—he'd been bored out of his mind and Sheppard had realized it quickly.

"Dr. Weir," he said.

She didn't answer, didn't even turn to acknowledge him, and Ronon realized she couldn't hear him over the sound of the thunder rumbling through the city.

He hated to disturb her, because he felt, somehow, that as she watched the lightning she was the most relaxed she'd been since arriving on Atlantis.

Or, Ronon thought with a wry grin, _he _felt that way, and was simply imprinting his own feelings on to her.

"Dr. Weir," he said, a little louder, and she turned, eyes wide and bright, though her brow was furrowed with worry.

"Ronon," she said, smiling slightly. "John has you playing messenger?"

He shrugged in time with the flash of lightning that split the air behind her, leaving a thick smell of ozone in the air. "I was bored. With comms down, he needed someone to relay messages. The work's not hard, so my particular skill set isn't required."

She nodded absently, then looked back out over the sea. "John wouldn't send you all this way for nothing. What is it?"

"McKay said the storm's going to get worse, and we should evacuate the piers and return everyone to the control tower immediately. He's predicting death for everyone still on the docks in five hours."

His answer was direct, as usual. Ronon didn't believe in skirting around bad news; Sheppard said Ronon's bluntness was "like ripping off a band-aid" and, having experienced himself, Ronon couldn't really disagree. His mother, the Squad Commander, had been the same: direct, blunt, and always honest. It'd been one of her finest qualities, in Ronon's mind, and one he'd tried to emulate when he'd joined the Service himself.

He ignored the twinge of loss—he'd gotten used to itHe looked out at the sea, gray like the clouds and waves crashing against the city, and waited for her response.

In a lull between the rumblings of thunder, he heard her sigh, a long, drawn out exhale, the sound of a decision being made the person wasn't entirely happy with. He had familiarity with the sound—his father, blessed with a healer's soul but forced to be a warrior—had emitted it at regular intervals through Ronon's life.

"We'll start with a quarter of the clean-up crews, staggering each crew so there's not a lull in the transporters," she said, still staring over the city. "Every half hour. Save senior leadership for last."

Ronon nodded in agreement. It was what he would have done, what Sheppard said Weir would do before Ronon had left the workers.

It was refreshing, Ronon thought as he watched Weir stare at the ocean, to follow orders of leaders who considered all the options. And who—as much as they could—put the _people_before the mission. It hadn't been that way on Sateda—though of course in Pegasus they had the Wraith.

Soldiers were expendable when the threat could kill you.

"Ronon?"

He looked over at Weir—Elizabeth, he reminded himself—who had turned around to face him. The storm was behind her, dark gray skies lightened by bright flashes, and the gray sea far below the balcony, churning, white waves crashing against the pier.

"When you were." She stopped, took a deep breath. "When you were running. Was there anything like this?"

This, Ronon figured, encompassed the violence of the storm, the thunder rumbling, the lightning flashes that crossed over the city, the rain pouring down, destroying the feeling of safety the city's inhabitants had from the shield.

If a storm could destroy a city, what defense did they have against the Wraith?

"Sure," he said. "A few planets before I met Sheppard, there was a planet that was mostly water, like this one. Storm came out of nowhere, destroyed an entire city in one day." He shrugged. "We had a couple on Sateda, like this one. Lasted about a week, then went away."

It was the longest speech he'd made in awhile, and Ronon stared at the ground. He hated sharing things about himself that didn't relate to the Wraith, or the fight against them. But when Weir smiled in relief, shoulders loosening just slightly, Ronon knew it was worth it.

"That's good news," she said, brushing her hair out of her eyes. "Thanks, Ronon."

"Sure," he said. "I'll let Sheppard know what the deal is."

"I believe that John is already aware of my decision," Elizabeth said, pointing at the group of people who just exited the transporter.

Ronon just shrugged, then remembered a phrase Sheppard had used when he and Rodney had agreed. "Great minds think alike," he said, hoping it was the right one.

Apparently it was, because Elizabeth laughed and when he walked back into the control room, she followed, still smiling. The underlying tension in her face and stance was still there, but she seemed a little more settled.

He smiled at one of the scientists on his way to the transporter, entering just as another thunder rumbled through the main tower, his steps lighter.

Storms were awesome.


End file.
